$4.5 billion spent in 2012 for safer drinking water

The central government has spent 28 billion yuan ($4.5 billion) this year on improving the drinking water of more than 70 million rural residents, according to the Ministry of Water Resources. Water safety problems in areas that suffered incidence of schistosome – sometimes known as blood-flukes, or flatworms – and high levels of arsenic and fluorine had been solved, said officials.